Live at Montmartre

New live recording from the legendary Jazzhus Montmartre in the heart of Copenhagen. This time with Rodney Green Quartet and Warren Wolf on vibraphone.

New live recording from the legendary Jazzhus Montmartre in the heart of Copenhagen. This time with Rodney Green Quartet and Warren Wolf on vibraphone.

The recordings on this release are chosen from three terrific evenings at Montmartre in February 2016. Christian Brorsen, Music Director at Montmartre 2011-2016, says: “Dexter Gordon said it himself when he returned to the United States after 14 years in Copenhagen: “I miss the American drummers.” If you have been lucky enough to experience one of them live, you know why. Among the masterful drummers who have visited Montmartre in the course of time, we find the likes of Art Blakey, Art Taylor, Ed Thigpen and Billy Higgins. Rodney Green belongs to a new generation of great drummers. Brought up by elite musicians such as Mulgrew Miller and Charlie Haden, he knows something about the nature of jazz and what it takes to perform on a level so few others are capable of. Rodney’s got it all: good taste, a dazzling technique, and a formidable beat”.

For Rodney Green, the music always comes first. It all looks so simple when he’s sitting there, behind the drum set. There’s no showing off, but it always sounds incredibly good, so there’s a good reason why he is so much in demand. Simplicity and authenticity also underpinned these three terrific evenings at Montmartre, where he was asked to put together a quartet of musicians who, like himself, are capable of being present in the moment, doing away with long rehearsals. “As far as I’m concerned, real jazz musicians must be able to meet and play without discussions or long rehearsals, and just let their instruments speak,” says Green.

And that is how these sessions unfolded at Montmartre, to the delight of an enthusiastic audience who couldn’t get enough of this ardent quartet of musicians that, besides Rodney Green, comprised Danish pianist Jacob Christoffersen and American bassist David Wong. Together the three laid a hard-swinging foundation for Warren Wolf´, also from the U.S. and possibly the greatest vibraphone virtuoso ever.